The RNA World: Piecing together the historical development of a hypothesis

Autores/as

  • Antonio Lazcano UNAM, Mexico City

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.7203/metode.6.5146

Palabras clave:

Origin of life, RNA World, ribonucleotidyl coenzymes, catalytic RNA

Resumen

The concept of an RNA world is a hypothesis firmly rooted in empirical data and is part of a long and complex scientific perspective that goes back more than fifty years to the discovery of the central role RNA and ribonucleotides play in protein synthesis and biochemical reactions took place. As the understanding of RNA biology progressed, several independent proposals of protein-free primordial life forms were suggested. Although this possibility was strongly reinforced with the discovery of ribozymes, there are many definitions of the RNA world, including several contradictory ones. One could say that it was an early, perhaps primordial, stage during which RNA molecules played a much more conspicuous role in heredity and metabolism and, particularly, in the origin and early evolution of protein biosynthesis. The overwhelming evidence for the catalytic, regulatory, and structural properties of RNA molecules, combined with their ubiquity in cellular processes, can only be explained with the proposal that they played a key role in early evolution and perhaps in the origin of life itself.

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Biografía del autor/a

Antonio Lazcano, UNAM, Mexico City

Full Professor of the Origin of Life at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. He is the author of scientific papers and books on the early stages of the evolution of life and has a long career in science communication in written media, radio and television. He is the director of the Lynn Margulis Galapagos Centre. He was the President of the ISSOL twice and is Honorary Doctor by the universities of Milan, Valencia and Michoacán. Since 2014, he is a member of El Colegio Nacional, the highest cultural and scientific distinction in Mexico. His current research interests include the chemistry of the origin of life and the use of phylogenomic databases to reconstruct early stages of cell evolution.

Citas

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Brachet, J. (1959). Les acides nucléiques et l’origine des proteins. In A. I. Oparin, A. G. Pasynskii, A. E. Braunshetin, & T. E. Pavloskaya (Eds.), The origin of life on Earth (pp. 361–367). New York: Pergamon Press/MacMillan Company.

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Lazcano, A. (2012). The biochemical roots of the RNA world: From zymonucleic acid to ribozymes. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 34, 407–424.

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Oparin, A. I., Pasynskii, A. G., Braunshetin, A. E., & Pavloskaya, T. E. (Eds.). (1959). The origin of life on Earth. New York: Pergamon Press/MacMillan Company.

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Woese, C. R. (1967). The Genetic Code: The molecular basis for gene expression. New York: Harper and Row.

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Publicado

15-04-2016

Cómo citar

Lazcano, A. (2016). The RNA World: Piecing together the historical development of a hypothesis. Metode Science Studies Journal, (6), 167–173. https://doi.org/10.7203/metode.6.5146
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Artículos en línea - Abril 2015

Sección

On the origin of life. An incomplete scientific story

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